March 16: Less personality,more politics please
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I know politics is about personality as much as policies
but even so, am I the only one to find the cloying interviews with
the spouses and partners of the various party leaders rather
mawkish?
Do we need these increasingly
schmaltzy insights into the personal habits of our would-be Prime
Ministers?
Does knowing that Dave Cameron
is a messy cook or that Gordon makes a racket when he gets up
really add anything to the sum of our knowledge?
So what if Dave wears boxers and
Gordon Y-fronts?
Watching Trevor
McDonald interview David Cameron on ITV
on Sunday was about a dispiriting experience you could have. You
didn't learn anything about his policies but we did glean that like
most husbands he has a lot of irritating habits.
Hardly the profoundest insight
into what makes him tick politically.
Gordon Brown
being compelled by Piers Morgan to recount, in
excrutiating detail, how it was that he came to propose to Sarah
was equally irritating.
I think it is important to know
whether politicians have what Denis Healey called
a hinterland but I cant help thinking the pendulum has swung way
too far towards politics becoming some kind of off-shoot of
entertainment.
A bit of personal background,
and knowing what experiences have informed our would-be leaders
beliefs, is fine.
But it really ought to be a case
of less being more although in an effort to make politics more"
engaging" I fear we are in for rather more in the run-up to the
general election. Let's hope the televised leaders' debates planned
for the election campaign don't revolve around who dresses down on
Fridays and who prefers ketchup to brown sauce. Otherwise, we might
just as well put them all on "Ready, Steady, Cook."
Interestingly, Nick
Clegg has so far resisted the Hello magazine style
treatment although even he was prevailed upon by BBC Breakfast to
tell us whether his wife would be featuring on the campaign
trail.
He might just make a virtue of
sticking to the matter in hand at the general election -
politics.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
I was in County Hall briefly
today and couldn't help noticing that the television in the
entrance foyer which is usually tuned in to "Kent TV" to give
visitors something to watch was switched off. Perhaps the council
is opting for a low-key close down. Or maybe trying to save
electricity.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Council pay-offs to departing
chief executives are in the news again today with the Audit
Commission criticising sums paid to council bosses who often leave
because they have fallen out with their political masters only to
re-surface elsewhere shortly after in another similar
job.
As we reported last year, KCC
has itself reached costly termination agreements with some of its
own former directors.
Boomerang
bosses under fire by spending
watchdog>>>>
Tuesday, March 16 2010
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